HEY BLOGGIES. I’ve been super excited for this blog post in particular because I really didn’t expect to have done almost any of the things I participated in this past week! It seems this summer break has really aided in the fostering of my own spontaneity. Here’s the song that’s been on repeat for me this week, Chammak Challo by Akon. One of my friends from the new summer friend group I mentioned in a previous post played the song at one of our house parties the other week, and I was promptly hooked on Bollywood tracks from then on.
Beginning with last Thursday, I had the extreme urge to buy a nazar amulet immediately. So I found myself on the 4:54 train, 20 minutes after work ended, riding towards a metaphysical shop I had never heard of on Newbury St. I take the green line to Back Bay, and the shop is nowhere to be found. 🙁 Either apple maps lied to me or I’m directionally challenged but before having the option to go back home, I realized I had missed the last train by 7 minutes. So I had about 2 hours to kill on Newbury until 9:45 pm. Now, I’ve visually consumed Newbury St to its fullest having been there at least 100 times, but I’ve avoided going into most of the storefronts knowing we were in starkly different tax brackets. However, I quite literally never go shopping for new clothes, only experiences, so I decided to explore some stores I had always resisted previous urges to go into. An hour and a half later, I exited Zara with a discounted fall coat back into the humid, 85 degree weather and tried Italian gelato for the first time at Amorina based off a Wellesley friend’s recommendation. My shake was like $9. But, #worthit tbh.
The very next day on Friday, I travel to Boston to participate in a predetermined bread-baking night with some new Wellesley friends who are researching at MIT. However, the host pushed back the time by a couple of hours so I found myself with time to kill again. This time I was near the Boston Public Library, an area I also know well, but this time, I saw a farmers market, and I was quickly intrigued. I only planned to window shop, but I think the binaural Bollywood beats of Chammak Challo blasting in my airpods manifested a very tasty looking Indian vendor directly in front of me. -$19
Also #worthit tbh.
Eventually, the bread was baked. We decided on garlic bread and impulsively got red velvet cake mix and made cake pops as well. The bread was SCRUMPTIOUS. I dubbed myself cheese-chooser and selected an italian blend as well as mozzarella. My battle that Friday night was refraining from taking a socially-unacceptable amount of bread every 15 minutes, and I almost lost I’ll be so honest.
Delectable
Cake Pops!
On Saturday I worked a full day at my second job and biked at mach 5 to catch the train into Boston to meet my other friend group for an annual Brazilian festival called “Festa Junina” in Cambridge. Adapted from European Midsummer, Festa Junina entails lots of social-dancing, specifically the “quadrilha,” an easy to learn square-dance. But rewinding for a moment, my friends came a little later than expected, so this time I found myself in Chinatown with another 2 hours for myself. I’ve been to Chinatown quite a bit, but I’ll never turn down an opportunity to add a new restaurant under my experience-belt and decided to get some dessert at a new place while I wait for my friends. I got a mango-kingdom which I’m pretty sure was just boba pearls, fresh mango, and ice cream. It was great though!
Big ups 2 Chinatown.
But back to Festa Junina, I got there by around 9 pm and my friends joined me soon after. We ended up hanging out, catching up on our weeks, and dancing until 11 pm! Literally none of us are Brazilian, nor do we speak Portuguese, but I love trying new things so I accepted my friend’s invitation without hesitation and it ended up being one of my favorite memories of the summer. And now I feel a little more versed in a new culture!! 🙂 Also maybe my Portuguese professor this fall will give me extra credit or something for knowing what a quadrilha is. 🧍♂️
Obrigada
To finish up my extremely long blog post, I decided to accidentally spontaneously bike for 2 hours around Wellesley Hills. I ended up biking to Olin College, Babson College, Wellesley High School, and down Fuller Brook Path. Here’s a picture.
POV: Avery loves biking.
Here’s an unrelated picture of me on Amity Path by a pretty lake during work on Saturday. Okay bye.
Amity Path!